Why I have a lemon in my freezer

Why I have a lemon in my freezer: coping/regulation strategies during the pursuit of healing

I chose this weight loss program because it addresses more than just weight loss. Each week I attend a group. This group is fantastic. I leave feeling heard, supportive, and with a feeling of community. The leader, Heather, is organized, but also fantastic at giving each member invested attention each week.

Our first group topic was Coping Strategies. I have degrees in Psychology and Sociology and a Master’s in OT, work experience with children specifically targeting emotional regulation strategies, and years of therapy. Even with all that experience, education, and mental health work, coping strategies/regulation strategies never seemed to be truly something I could integrate into my life. I do a great job helping Katya in this area and she now automatically put in a lot of her strategies to regulate herself, but I struggle to incorporate them in my life- perhaps because many of my maladaptive coping/regulation strategies have been in place for decades.

Coping strategies we came up with in class

Our leader, Heather, explained that if, on a scale of 1-10, your stress level is a 7-10, in order to cope with the situation you need distraction to help you manage and to regulate yourself. When your stress is between a 3 and 6.9, you need self-soothing strategies. Once you are between 1-2.9, you are able to implement strategies to improve the moment. I love this, because it has shown me a lot. she had us come up with examples of strategies for each category- non-eating ones of course!

One of the strategies she mentioned in using a frozen whole orange as a grounding technique. A grounding technique is a technique that immediately connects you with the present moment. I have tried some with mixed results. Heather said to freeze an orange and then when you are at a 7-10, get the orange out of the freezer and hold it. The cold will get your attention (distraction) and help you get to a place where you can use your other senses to connect with the present (e.g. scratch the peel and smell it, look at the color, etc). I decided to try it out. We had a plethora of lemons at the time, so I froze a lemon instead.

I am undergoing EMDR therapy targeting trauma. In correlation with this, I’ve had some difficult days. I find that once every couple of weeks, I end up being having an immediate trauma response to a trigger. The other day it happened when I was dealing with the toddler the other day. I was really struggling. I decided to get the lemon out of the freezer and try it. You know what? It worked! It brought me back to reality, helped me calm down, and helped me feel in charge of my body. It was wonderful. 

I’m not proud of how my morning went, but I can look back and see the good things that happened. While I was sitting there on the floor of my kitchen with the frozen lemon in my hand, Katya was sitting in her rocking chair— one of her favorite calming strategies. I did lots of story-telling (where you talk about what happened as a story to help process an event that was upsetting or traumatic) with her the rest of the day and eventually she drew a picture of what happened and then changed it to show we were happy now. My play-therapist mom, said that this demonstrated that Katya had processed the events healthily. So, there you go- I used a new strategy to help me and was able to help her process as well. While not my best day, I think I could have done a lot worse.

I think the lemon will stay in the freezer for now. At least until I am done with EMDR and don’t have any more trauma responses.

Review of my first 9 days of nutrimed shakes and soups (Week 2 and beginning of week 3)

The first week of no solid food is over and the results are in! Weigh in was on Tuesday night and I had lost 11 pounds! I am so excited! I know that following weeks will not have as big of a weight drop, but considering that it is about 1/8 or 12.5% towards my goal, I am excited for this start. The average weight loss is 3-5 lbs per week so I am estimating that it may take me 20 more weeks to lose the rest of the weight. If this happens that means I will be about my goal at the end of June.

I am going to recap my first 3 days as those were the most transitory days for me.

Wednesday, January 30 First Day of Shakes

I woke up at 5am and did my bible study, updated my bullet journal, put a load of laundry in; wrote in my prayer journal and then around 7am made my first shake! I made a chocolate shake, but I used hot water and blended it so that it was basically a yummy hot chocolate. I was SUPER hungry all day long, and to make it even more difficult, my 2 year old had been throwing up the night before so instead of a busy day full of distractions as planned, I was faced with an entire day of sitting at home making it hard to avoid eating as I usually do. Needless to say it was difficult and I was HUNGRY. Perhaps the most interesting thing to me was how cold I was by the afternoon! I was so cold that I basically sat on the couch covered in blankets in attempt to stay warm. I had a terrible headache as well and nothing seemed to help. I had 6 shakes instead of 5 to take the edge off of the hunger before bed and made sure to wear warm pajamas that night!



Thursday, January 31, Day 2

On Thursday my morning started the same as Wednesday and I had my shakes. I was nervous because I had MOPS (Mothers of Preschoolers) that morning and there always in a lovely warm breakfast there and it is one of the few places I usually am pressured into eating even if I don't want to. As I am still fairly new to the group
, I really didn't want to tell them about the diet either. Thankfully, for whatever reason, no one noticed that I wasn't eating so there was no pressure. I did have to have a shake during MOPS, so I made a hot mocha shake beforehand and it totally blended in with all the other coffee thermoses around the table. It was super rainy that day, so that afternoon instead of sitting around trying no to eat, Katya and I went outside to play in puddles. It was so much fun! She also drew this excellent picture of me! The first person I have seen her draw completely independent of anyone else's input. I think it is the most beautiful picture I have ever seen. I had a 6th shake this day as well because I realized right as I was going to bed that I had forgotten to take my second potassium pill and I have to take it with food. Each shake is only100 calories, so an additional shake on occasion doesn't really change much.



Friday, February 1, Day 3

On Friday I realized I was significantly less hungry, had no headache, and had a lot of energy. It was great! I think my body entered ketosis that day and it may have been what made the difference. I made sure to add trackers to my bullet journal to help me stay on top of making sure I get all my shakes, supplements, vitamins, fiber, and potassium. The hardest part of the day is during Katya's nap time when I used to snack while cleaning. I have been staying on top of the cleaning to avoid snacking and I made a bunch of flowers for my cousin's wedding as well as a gift for my friend during her naptime. It was really hard to sit on the couch during movie night with Katya and my hubby. I really wanted to eat the popcorn and Katya kept offering me some.



Since then, it has been fairly easy. I am finding being at home while doing this is harder than it was to be working full time the last time I did the shakes. There is less of a schedule and more wandering into the kitchen for no real reason (as well as many real reasons!). Two times I found I put something in my mouth without even realizing it until I tasted it! I immediately spit it out, but it really revealed to me how much eating I do without even noticing (mostly off the toddler plate leftovers unfortunately!). It has been pretty easy to do the shakes in social situations, but I think a lot of that has to do with the fact that I have done this before so I don't feel that nervous about it. I have just stated matter of factly that I am not eating and have my shake. Then if asked, I can explain with as many details as I want to.

Living in Hope-- in the Midst of Infertility

I have been thinking about this post for over a week now. I have written it in my head a dozen times- each time it is different. It seems every day there is something different that I would want to share, but the overwhelming drive behind this post is to expound on how it is even possible to live in hope during infertility. I am not going to give a timeline or go into detail about the medical part about our infertility journey in this post. I will save that for another day. This entry is about how what seemed impossible (having hope during infertility) not only became possible, but currently is my life.

NOTE: "IF" is the abbreviation for "infertility". So if you see "IF" in my writing, you now know what it means.

Decisions to start a family are all about hope-- hoping for pregnancy to occur, hoping for a boy, hoping for a girl, hoping that you have a baby in the Spring, hoping that you will be a good parent, hoping that your children won't have any disabilities. It's scary and exciting. These hopes are also very personal and dear to the heart-- usually the most precious of these hopes are only shared between partners, although I'm sure no one shares all their hopes even with their partner. I'm sure there are people that find it more scary than exciting, but for me and Andy, our decision to start a family was full of hope and we were excited!

I don't know if I can explain how it feels to be told that all these hopes may never come to pass without ART (assistive reproductive technology-- read more here). I have never experienced any other situation that caused me an emotional response that this news provided. I was grieved, disappointed, discouraged, lost, depressed, in despair, frightened, and angry-- just to name a few of the intense emotions I felt. All those hopes I had when we decided to go off the birth control and begin planning for a baby had been replaced by worry and stress as we went over a year with no success, but being told not only were we BOTH infertile but that we have significantly less than 1% of a chance of getting pregnant on our own was a horse of another color. You cannot understand it unless you've been there-- and even then everybody experiences it differently as every person and every story is different.

I can tell you how I experienced the despair this brought about:

• random bursting out in tears in privacy, at work, in the car, at the doctor's office, etc
• intense jealousy whenever I saw a pregnant woman, heard a story about how easy it was for so-and-so to get pregnant, etc
• bitterness and resentfulness whenever I heard someone complain about being pregnant "again" or tell me "you're young, don't worry" or "just relax" or "just adopt"
• panic attacks before baby showers
• fighting with Andy
• anger whenever I heard someone talk about how they would be willing to have a baby and give it to so-and-so who is infertile (as if that will just fix things?)
• stopped attending church on a regular basis as church seemed to make everything worse (in reality I was also mad at God)

The good things I did were:

• I joined a local infertility support group (if you are currently undergoing infertility and live in the San Diego area, please check us out at http://sandiegocookies.proboards.com. If you live elsewhere, Resolve.org has lists of local infertility support groups).
• I began to be open about my journey
• I started therapy
• I began spending my alone time telling God exactly how I felt, no matter how negative the emotion
• I began setting boundaries to avoid the painful situations I could not handle

About a year ago, I realized that when I thought about who I am the first thing I thought was "infertile". I decided that I WOULD NOT LET INFERTILITY DEFINE ME. I would not live in despair as that was not fair to me. Just because Andrew and I are infertile, does not mean that all of the other good things in my life are any less good. I began to work really hard at following through with all the "homework" my counselor gave me. I began to focus on the good things and talk to God about the good He has put in my life. I began to see opportunity. I began to nurture my inner child. I continued to be active online in my IF support group even though I stopped going to meetings. Andy and I decided to take a year off of all IF related things and were able to interact simple as a newly married couple and actually RELAXED and had FUN! All this revealed to me that there is so much hope-- even in my situation. I have a God who is hope and loves me! I have a husband who loves me and is always there for me. There is more to me and more in store for me-- even if I never have a child, even if Andy and I decide to be childfree!

My life has been changed because of hope. Of course, I still have moments where the sadness and grief overwhelm me. When I heard my brother was having a baby, I was so excited for him and immediately loved the baby. However, my sense of loss was great. The losses I thought about included:

• my not having a baby
• my not having a cousin to give this nephew to be and maybe never being able to give him one
• being unable to give my brother and sister in law of any advice or words of wisdom as they start this part of their journey
• potential loss of any shared parenting experience alongside my brother and sister in law in the future (e.g. never having the opportunity to take our children to Disneyland or camping together, never having a chance to exchange parenting stories, no future opportunity to exchange hand me down clothes, this list could go on and on)
• continued empty womb and empty arms with no promise they would ever be filled

Once I was dealt with my grief for a few days, I was reminded again that my loss does not mean the good things in my life are any less good. Just because I experienced loss, does not mean remove any of the love and excitement that I have about my nephew that will be born in October. Once I remembered this  I began making items for the baby and was able to focus my attention to him (I think I will refer to him as Miller Mouse until I know what his name will be- a reference to a nick-name my brother gave himself around age 3). I was able to focus my attention on how good of a father my brother will be, on how great an aunt my sister will be, how nice it will be to have the Miller family name continue on, etc... Now the loss is diminished so I don't notice it. I am so filled with joy, excitement, and HOPE about Miller Mouse's arrival. I am looking forward to being an aunt and see possibility and good things. October can't come fast enough!